White Man Bombs 16th Street Baptist Church
In Birmingham, a white man is seen placing a box containing a bomb under the steps of the 16th Street Baptist Church, a black congregation. The explosion kills four black girls attending Sunday school. Twenty-three others people are also injured in the blast.
I Have a Dream Delivered on Washington Mall
Martin Luther King delivers his I Have a Dream Speech on the Washington Mall, which becomes an enduring symbol of King’s legacy and influence.
The Largest Cohort of African American Men Graduate Harvard
As Author Kent Garrett put it: “In the fall of 1959, Harvard recruited an unprecedented eighteen “Negro” boys as an early form of affirmative action. Four years later [in 1963] they would graduate as African Americans.”